Dismemberment in the Bay Murder Trial — FL v. Robert Kessler — Full Sentencing

[00:00:00] Speaker 1: This is the victim's son, Sean. [00:00:18] Speaker 2: Hello, Sean. Are you aware of the names that we saw on the tattoo? Yes, sir. Who's this young lady with you? This is my wife, Amanda. Hi, Amanda. Thanks for being here. Y'all came from Pennsylvania, right? [00:00:31] Speaker 3: We all. [00:00:32] Speaker 2: Alabama. What part of Alabama? Montgomery area. Okay. I'm from Birmingham. Alabama. I went to the University of Alabama. So roll tide or Auburn? Roll tide. Auburn? Roll tide. You better say roll tide. Good, good, good. Here, folks. Thanks for being here and thanks for helping your mom out. I know your mom's been going through a lot. So what did you like to tell me? [00:00:51] Sean: I just wrote something on my phone. Is that right? [00:00:53] Speaker 2: You're good? [00:00:56] Sean: Good afternoon, Your Honor. For five years, my family has waited for justice. Five years of delays, excuses, and watching a system that seems to offer more protection and consideration to the man who murdered her and herself. My mother was brutally murdered, dismembered, and discarded in the K-Bay, like she was nothing. She was a human being, and she deserved better. For five years, we have watched this case get delayed over questions of the defendant's mental competency. And after all that time, we finally got our day in court, and he wasn't even required to be here for the majority of it. We've been here, we've listened to the horrific details, and accepted the evidence, and relived what my mother went through, the lengths that Kessler went through to cover it up. Yet the man responsible has avoided sitting in the same form as us. I understand the defendant has constitutional rights. I do get that. Somewhere along the lines, it feels that the rights of the accused have completely overshadowed the rights of the victims, in this case, in cases across the country. My mother had rights, and she had the right to live, and that was stolen from her. I want to make something very clear. My frustration is not with the prosecution or you. It is... They've done an outstanding job, and they have fought to bring this case to trial as quickly as the law would allow. My family is extremely grateful for all the work you guys have done. Thank you. My frustrations with the system that allow the process to drag on for five years, so my family has been left waiting for accountability. To Mr. Kessler, you've avoided sitting in the same room as us. You've avoided looking at the family, his lives destroyed, but you can't erase what you did. You're 74 years old. You've already spent roughly 26 years of your life incarcerated for a variety of other crimes. You know what prison's like. You know what consequences are. And after serving all that time, you were given another opportunity to live your life as a free man. How many chances does someone like you get? How many times does a system have to give you another opportunity? Pouring off is enough. You've had your chances. Your Honor, I'm not asking for sympathy. I'm asking for accountability. I ask that the crime received in maximum punishment permitted by law. And given the defendant's age, I ask that his sentence be served in the most restricted prison environment, legally appropriate. At 74 years old, he may not have many years left, but whatever time he does have, should carry the full weight of the consequences of his actions. His age should not become another reason for delineancy, or another opportunity to avoid meaningful punishment. He took away every remaining year of my mother's life, why she was shown any mercy, simply because he's running out of years of his own. Five years of this case has been all about the defendant's rights. His competency, his delays, his ability to stay in trial. I'm hoping today it becomes about my mother's rights. She didn't get a second chance, she didn't get the choice, she certainly didn't get five years of opportunity to avoid what was coming. My mother mattered, her life mattered, and she deserved a justice system that treated her with the same importance it is given in protecting the rights of the men who tell her hers. Thank you, Your Honor. [00:04:19] Speaker 2: Would you give me a favor? Sir. Tell me the best memory you have for your mom. Let's send us a little positive note, let's quit talking about Mr. Kessler, and talk about your mom. You don't need a phone for that, I want you to tell me something good about your mom. One of your best memories. You know what, that's what's important. [00:04:37] Sean: It is important. [00:04:37] Speaker 2: I mean, it was important, but I want you to end this on something positive about your mother, because like you said, this is her day too. [00:04:46] Sean: Well, we had a good time when it came to sports in high school, middle school, played soccer a lot growing up. I left for the Marine Corps at a young age, and I wasn't around very much after that. But definitely, in the times when we were home, she did enjoy playing with her grandkids, our two kids. It was something to remember. [00:05:07] Speaker 2: Thank you for that. So again, sorry, very sorry for your loss. Thank you. Mr. Harmon, is there anyone else like to say something to the court? No, you're on. All right. Well, I'll hear from your presentation first, and then we'll run with the score sheet. I don't know what the defense has to say. I was handed during that presentation a score sheet, and the score sheet indicates it's got the two charges in which he was convicted by the jury a few minutes ago. The points for victim injury points, which is the second to be murder points, 240. Correct. Then it's got prior convictions that I have on here. And the total, it appears, first of all, the charge he was convicted of was a first-year felony punished by life in prison. So he could get life in prison on that offense by itself. And then the second offense, he'd get 15 years maximum on that one. Is that correct at this point? That's correct. All right. And the score sheet is 308 months total, but again, he could get life in prison because of the charge, correct? Correct. Based on that, what would you like to tell me as far as your position in the case, as far as what you would recommend as an appropriate sentence based on the jury's verdict? [00:06:35] Speaker 1: Well, Judge, I don't want to rehash my closing statement to the jury, but this woman did not die an easy death. We know that. We know that she struggled and fought for her life. We don't know the full extent of injuries to her. As the medical examiner told us, she had to rule this as homicidal violence in addition to the stab wounds. But we know she suffered at least those four stab wounds and the incised knife wounds to her hand, where her hand was cut as she was grabbing that knife to defend herself and ward it off from her. I don't think the court or any of us could give full credit, probably, to the terror that she went through during that process of dying. But her death, it wasn't bad enough. This defendant then desecrated her body. He mutilated a human body. And then he dumped her body into the bay like it was just told to you, as if she was some refuse or garbage, loaded her up in his van on multiple occasions in bins and garbage bags. This woman who had been a mother and a grandmother and just discarded her. And then her remains floated amongst all these strangers in the daylight, decomposing. It's, your honor, despicable what this defendant did. It's absolutely despicable. I can't even imagine how much blood this defendant was covered in as he was sawing through her remains and chopping her body up. As such, Judge, and that is something completely a separate evil to the second-degree murder, we would ask the court, first of all, for the maximum on the second-degree murder. We'd ask for a life sentence at second-degree murder with a weapon. And we would ask that the court sentence the defendant to the maximum on the abuse of a dead human body for the mutilation of Ms. Krohn-Overholtz's body of a consecutive sentence of 15 years for that second-degree felony. [00:08:52] Speaker 2: Anything else? No, Your Honor. Thank you. All right. Good morning. Good afternoon, Ms. Tucker. [00:08:59] Speaker 3: Good afternoon, Your Honor. [00:09:01] Speaker 2: First of all, do you have any witnesses you'd like to produce at this time? [00:09:03] Speaker 3: Okay. Can I confer with my client, please? Thank you. No, I don't, Your Honor. [00:09:27] Speaker 2: All right. What would you like to say? [00:09:29] Speaker 3: And I think the court's probably very well aware, virtually any sentences court gives Mr. Kessler is going to be a life sentence. But I would just request that the court sentence Mr. Kessler in accordance with the criminal punishment code score sheet. [00:09:44] Speaker 2: Thank you very much. All right, Mr. Kessler, good afternoon. How are you doing? A lot better than you are. Okay? A hell of a lot better than you are. So just listen to me for a minute, okay? Because I've given you plenty of opportunities to speak. So you're going to listen to me now, okay? [00:10:01] Speaker 1: Yes. [00:10:02] Speaker 2: Number one is now my job to sentence you for what you've been convicted of. And that's second to be murdered with a weapon and abuse of a dead human body. So, first of all, your murderous acts created, in my mind, at least three victims. The first one, obviously, was Stephanie. We'd be bludgeoning her to death and killed her. She was looking for some place to live. You had the grandpa, young kid card that you played to convince her to come back to your house. Okay? So that's the card you played, the nice old grandpa. Come back, I'll give you a place to stay for a couple of weeks. And then we just decided to kill her in a horrible, horrible way. But that wasn't enough for you. You have to go full-hand electorance and cut the body up in at least seven different pieces. That is, like, that's movie-like. That's, like, unheard of. Forty years in this system, as a public defender, as a prosecutor, as a judge. I've never heard of this before. Cutting someone up like that. Ten feet away from when the girl was sleeping. You know, it's incredible that that would happen. And even after you went full electorate on her, that wasn't enough for you. You then have to throw her body in the water off of a bridge? What is that even all about? I mean, the murder wasn't enough. Cutting her up wasn't enough. You've got to go f- It's absolutely just bizarre. You've got 23 felony convictions. I didn't know what you're doing on the street. I don't know how the heck you even got possession or custody of this child. I understand her mother overdosed and somehow you end up being in charge for some reason. I don't even know how that happened. Thankfully, she wasn't hurt. The second victim, besides Stephanie, is her mother, nobody should ever see their child die, first of all, but they have to come to court and see her daughter's leg bobbing in the water. I'll never forget that the rest of my life. I've never seen it like that in my life. I'll never forget that. But as a parent to see their daughter's leg bobbing up and down in the water? Really? She's never going to forget. I'm never going to forget that. She didn't deserve that. She didn't deserve her daughter to be treated that. No parent ever needs to see their kid murder, number one, chopped up in seven or eight pieces, and then thrown into the water. No parent deserves that. So she's the seventh victim. And the third victim, at least that I'm aware of, is this young girl. And who knows what memories of what this is going to do to her if she grows older. She seemed like she had a pretty positive attitude when I saw her in court, but who knows what's going to happen. Thankfully, she's away from you. She's out of this state and hopefully is not too starved from what happened in this whole incident. At age 12, because she doesn't deserve that either. So you're asked to raise at least three victims and probably a lot more. But I can assure everyone that Tampa Bay is much safer when you're off the street. And that's what you're going to be, is off the street. So that's the count one. Secondary murder with a weapon. I'm sent you to life in prison. Adjudicate you life in prison. That's the count two. It'll be 15 years in a Florida state prison. Executive to the life in prison. And the last thing before you go, to spend the rest of your life in the penitentiary, is I didn't appreciate that statement, that comical statement about that stupid cheesesteak. That was inappropriate and it was rude. This is a serious matter. All right? So you want to go have a cheesesteak, good luck with that. Because you're going to Florida state prison. I don't think that's going to happen. Your third-day speaker judgment sent, sir. Please take him away. [00:14:24] Speaker ?: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.